Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has reportedly gained the ire of some in the Trump administration due to his aggressive style, according to a report.
"Some Cabinet secretaries and senior officials in the administration are increasingly wary of what they describe as his brash and controlling style," Politico reported, citing unnamed sources. Specifically, the report referenced Lutnick's tendancy to take credit for deals and also referenced a recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that claimed Trump's tariff policies would lead to $18 trillion in investment in the U.S.
The Cato Institute published a detailed analysis that debunked the claim entitled "Trump's $18 trillion Fantasy".
"The reality is that only a small fraction of that [promised sum] has any specifics behind it and can really be considered new investment. So the rest of it is just repackaged stuff that they were already going to do, or stuff that's related to the AI boom and has almost nothing to do with tariffs," Scott Lincicome, the vice president of general economics at the Cato Institute told Politico.
White House spokesperson Kush Desai told Politico that Trump "maintains complete confidence in Secretary Lutnick because he has been the most transformative Commerce Secretary in modern history and is a champion of the President's America First trade and tariffs policies."
The statement noted that Lutnick "played a key role helping President Trump secure historic trade deals with the European Union and Japan as well as a $250 billion investment deal with Taiwan."
Lutnick still is facing heat related to revelations from the Epstein files. Lutnick testified to the Senate Appropriations Committee that he had lunch with Jeffrey Epstein in 2012 on Epstein's island. The testimony contradicted previous statements that Lutnick had cutoff all contact with Epstein in 2005, three years before Epstein's conviction for soliciting a minor for prostitution.
"I did have lunch with him, as I was on a boat going across on a family vacation," Lutnick said according to CNBC. "My wife was with me, as were my four children and nannies," he said. "I had another couple with — they were there as well, with their children. And we had lunch on the island, that is true, for an hour."
Epstein killed himself in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. The 2019 indictment alleged that Epstein sexually exploited and abused dozens of underage girls by enticing them to engage in sex acts with him in exchange for money.
CBS News reported that documents released by the Justice Department also show Lutnick and Epstein were both signatories, through limited liability companies, on a December 2012 agreement to acquire stakes in Adfin, an advertising-technology company that later shuttered.
